More about me than you wanted to know.

I don’t understand why the Bible caught on.
I don’t feel like expanding my views on that sentence.

We had the most disgusting Bible lesson in seminary today about gay sex and incest.
It was sickening (and we say Hollywood’s corrupt).
I understand that sick, gross things happen and have happened, but seriously, I don’t want to read about it with a room full of freshmen who need terms defined.

I cried in seminary today.
The teacher told us about his disturbed youth phase.
It reminded me of mine.
I felt like an idiot, and my makeup smeared all over.

The year I was 14 was my most traumatic so far.
Imagine paranoia as a constant, physical sickness. Imagine an all-consuming preoccupation with thinking someone’s going to FIND OUT, and fearing the consequences so much that you endanger your own life to protect a secret.
I lost many friends, in the most literal sense.
I think it’s also why I’m so messed up when it comes to guys.
I was insecure as a freshman girl. I turned to people who’d accept me no matter what, no matter who they were, no matter who I was. I found them, and it didn’t matter to me that they didn’t care about me, because I’d finally found boys who’d use my name when they talked to me.
I felt stereotypically hardcore.
I wore black, heavy eye makeup and streaked my hair pink.
That’s where it started.
Reality followed.
Every single boy I hung out with was into heavy drugs, and my life transformed into a constant cover-up. They’d come over stoned or drunk, and it fell to me to hide them from my parents and keep them from destructive behavior when they couldn’t control their actions.
One time, I had to physically fight to wrench a prescription bottle from one of my best guy friends because he had gotten into my friend's medicine cabinet and was taking pain pills, one after another.
I got hurt.
Nobody knew.
I made sure of that.
I was more involved than I’ll ever admit, even here on the Internet where nobody knows who I am.
I did some things I’ll never mention again.
I needed an experience, something to transcend what was here, because I realized that I’d never be satisfied, that even my beloved Equilibrium was a creation of my own mind.
It wasn’t real, and neither was I.
In reality, I was miserable, but I was so caught up in the cycle that I never dreamed of leaving it.

Then, I got an idea.
While everyone else fried their brains, I started to do what I do best—research.
I became an illicit mini-doctor.
People came to me for advice that could ultimately concern whether they lived or died.
At 14, this was both extremely dangerous and extremely exciting.
I used to be so good that I could watch a stoned kid for a few minutes and tell you what he was on, how long ago he’d taken it, what it was doing to his body right at that moment, how long it would take before it’d be out of his system enough to pass a drug test, what best to do to hide it until then, and what to do to ease the “comedown.”
I memorized narcotic chemical structures and perused medical studies on the computer after my parents were asleep, applying the concepts to my own ready-made “control group” of druggies and using the results to form conclusions on which to base my advice.
I could tell my friends which amounts of which drugs (prescription, illegal, or both) would combine well together and which would be too harmful to even try.
I gave mini-lectures on alcohol poisoning (acute alcohol intoxication) and what to do when (not if) it happened. I made them promise to call 911 if a friend’ respirations fell below 13 per minute, but I don’t think they listened.
At least no one died.
At least, not physically.
Drugs suck out your soul and replace it with the burnt ashes of the person you used to be.

Don’t do drugs.